PAKISTAN: A 16-year Christian boy is expected to be sentenced to death after being found wanting on the grounds of sharing a "blasphemous" photo on his Facebook account. The young lad was arrested after he committed the act and subsequently accused of blasphemy.
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The Kaaba is a huge black cube-shaped structure constructed around a very old stone located at the middle of the Al-Masjid Al-Haram mosque, regarded as Islam's most holy site in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Pakistani locals testified that the image in question uploaded by the boy showed a pig's head over the Kaaba.
According to Shahbaz Ahmed, a Pakistani police official, an informant sent reports to police officers concerning the facebook post. The informant described the alleged post as being hurtful to Muslims and a desecration of the Kaaba. According to the informant the lad had commited a grave injustice to muslims by sorely hurting their Islamic feelings.
The Pakistani Police however declined to release details of the photo or contents of the said post, other than it contained an image of the holy Kaaba. It is however not certain if the young boy uploaded the photo himself, was tagged to the post by someone else or just "liked" the post.
As prescribed by Pakistan’s unappealing blasphemy laws, the teenager must face the death penalty or resign himself to a lifetime in prison.
The controversial Facebook post which has since been taken down, however, did not stop his family from forcefully abandoning their residence in Bhai Pheru out of the fear and threats of violent attacks as their son awaits his judgement in jail.
Wilson Chowdhry, who is the leader of the British Pakistani Christian Association, BPCA reacted by saying that the incident stressed the disregard and lack of respect for Christians in the Pakistani nation. Wilson said the 16-year-old boy accused of blasphemy was placed in prison custody without any proper investigation into the matter.
Wilson stressed further that social media could be a force for virtue or for vice, stating that few people understood the blasphemy entrapment non-muslims and Christians face daily in Pakistan and often on excusable and grossly intangible evidence, for which he could vision social media acting as prolific weapon to fight such injustice.
He said further that the Pakistani Christian community makes genuine attempts trying to be an active part of their society and make friendships with the local Muslim community, stressing that It was hard to be an integral part of the local community when they excluded the largest diversity. He however hoped that in the nearest future Pakistani Christians should be more careful when accepting friendship requests from Muslims on their social media accounts.
He opined that even long term friends would demand for one's head if they felt that one had made ridicule of their Islamic faith, advising non-Muslims to be wary of such hatred and animosity by staying clear off muslims subsequently.
It has been reported widely by Human rights organisations worldwide that Pakistan’s blasphemy laws often victimize religious minority groups. According to records, “hurting religious feelings or sentiments”, “mocking remarks” and “disrespecting the Quran” are all viewed as punishable crimes.
Pakistan is the sixth most dangerous country on the globe for Christians and non-believers where the country's blasphemy laws are often abused or manipulated to settle personal scores or disagreements.
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